


IronSquib

by SherlockMalfoy



Series: Iron Squib and Other Magical Tales [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Squib, Tony is a squib, magic and tech
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-12
Updated: 2018-08-12
Packaged: 2019-06-26 11:12:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15662070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherlockMalfoy/pseuds/SherlockMalfoy
Summary: In the aftermath of fighting Stane and becoming Iron Man, Tony's not exactly pleased to learn that with the new glowing hunk of metal in his chest, he can't come within a hundred feet of his magical relations from England.Tony being Tony, well, he'll just have to fix that.





	IronSquib

    Tony was not happy.  
    Tony was beyond angry. He was livid.   
    Unlike Howard, when Tony got angry he got loud and stubborn and even more determined to get his way. Tony might have looked just enough like Howard and Maria so people never looked twice at him, but for all that he had his real father's temper. The one that wanted to break things to make himself feel better - and he HAD felt better after taking out the Stark weapons cache in Gulmira.   
    Unfortunately, there really wasn't anything in his garage he felt like fixing if he broke it.   
    "What do you mean I can't come to visit!? I've just gone to hell and back, had to pretty much kill my godfather, and to top it all off became a superhero practically overnight! I don't say this ever, because I'm a damn genius and I love my tech, but sometimes I just need to get the hell away from all this for a while!"   
    He could imagine wincing and cringing on the other end of the line as he threw the wrench across the garage in frustration. "Are you telling me I can't even ride my gorgeous-"   
_"Exactly!"_ snapped the equally frustrated accented voice on the other end of the line. _"That's exactly what I'm telling you, Tony. No magic. None. I mean until we test the limits. Maybe, for all I know, a little luck charm or a notice-me-not but son, if I come within a hundred feet of you that damn thing on your chest starts to flicker. Imagine what it'd be like in the Burrow?!"_   
    "Well that's just great then isn't it!" Tony snapped back bitterly, running his hands through his hair as he continued to shout at Harry through the call with JARVIS. "First I find out I'm adopted! THEN I find out that my parents are freaking WIZARDS with pointy hats and everything but I can't even float around a fresh cup of coffee!"   
_"Tony that's not-"_   
    "And now, because I'm even more a freak because if i want to see the only family I've got left I could die! Or, I can take this hunk of glowing metal out of my chest and die anyway!"   
_"Cedric Potter,"_ he heard Harry growl angrily through the phone at him. Tony hated that name. It sounded ridiculous. Plus the only one that ever called him that was Harry, and only when he was truly about ready to unload some righteous anger at him. Sometimes complete with a bit of spontaneous combustion of nearby objects. _"Never call yourself that word where I can hear it again."_   
    "Right.... the F word. You hate that word. Great aunt Petunia. Forgot," Tony snapped back sarcastically and rolled his eyes. He picked up another wrench and fiddled with it before dropping it back down into his toolbox. "Might want to relax pops. Don't want to raise your blood pressure and kill another phone."   
    He could hear Harry sigh and muttering to himself. _"We'll figure this out. I've already talked to your aunt and she's been fiddling with our phones some,"_ he said. _"Thank you for those by the way."_   
    "Yeah yeah. I needed someone to test some prototypes for me. Figures once Hermione got her grubby old hands on one she'd start trying to see if she could do magic to it. How did hers hold up?"   
    _"Rather well actually. She suggested we send you samples of goblin metals to analyze, especially after seeing your suit on the telly."_   
    "The Weasley's got a TV? How does it not explode?"   
    _"Ah no. She was visiting her aunt at the rest home while working with MACUSA on some new creature law. Sometimes having the news on helps Peg sleep."_   
    Tony frowned and made a mental note to fly out and visit her. He hadn't realized Harry was still talking until he heard mention of the suit.   
    _"So red and gold huh?"_   
    "JARVIS thinks it's too flashy."   
    _"I'd have gone with a more subdued red. A proper Gryffindor red."_   
    "Because you're old."   
    _"But the hot rod red works. Imagine walking into Diagon Alley in that thing. Oh that'd put all the pureblood noses out of joint, just you watch."_   
    And that gave Tony a really bright idea, but couldn't say it out loud since the lovely Pepper Potts was just coming down the steps. "Hey, Pepper's here so I'll call you back. I'm not done yelling at you about this."   
_"Of course you're not,"_ Harry muttered before hanging up. Tony snatched up his phone and shot a quick text to Harry about the goblin metals and a few questions to ask his aunt next time he saw her.   
    "You missed another meeting," Pepper said firmly, glaring at him.   
    Oh it was going to be a really long day…

  
**o0o**   


    One of the little known facts about international shipping companies, Tony learned, is that DHL is terrible only because it was owned and operated by wizards who had no idea how muggle shipping companies were meant to operate.  
    Unfortunately, because it is owned by wizards it means that all the wizards who need to ship things internationally use it. Which makes for an even worse mess.   
    After they lost the package from Bill Weasley no less than thirty-three times it finally arrived, battered and beaten, by a third party carrier driving a Ford Pinto. "You have no idea how often this happens with DHL," the delivery woman said boredly, as if she said the same thing hundreds of times a week. And when Tony thought about it, she probably did.   
    "You'll have to hold it," he said, indicating the tablet. "I don't like to be handed things."   
    She shrugged. "I've heard weirder," she replied. "I mean, you're Iron Man. You'd think I'd be super excited, right," she said as he took out his own stylus and signed for the package. "But honestly, I delivered a box this morning to a house having an orgy in the back yard and the box bleated at me. Fuckin' wizards I swear." She shook her head, checked that her paperwork was in order and gave a nod. "Meeting Iron Man is tame compared to the shit I see in this job."   
    Tony stared at her before picking up his box and backing into the door. "JARVIS!"   
    "Yes Mr. Stark?"   
    "Make sure that driver never comes back to this house again. I don't care what it takes," he said, shutting the door with his foot and making a beeline for the stairs. "Have we installed the blackout glass in the lab yet?"   
    "Yes sir."   
    "Good. Start the Hocus Pocus protocol and open the Abracadabra file for me would you." By the time Tony reached the bottom of the stairs the glass walls of the lab were pitch black. When he passed through the door closed and locked behind him. The file he'd started with everything he could possibly find on magic and its effects on tech, much of it his own research over the years since reconnecting with his birth father, was splayed across the holographic interface. He examined the documents and observations as he unpacked the box. There was a note from his uncle Bill explaining that if he needed more, Goblins were very greedy and didn't give up their metals freely. It also mentioned that they'd been checked to ensure all the samples were magically inert to prevent interference from his... condition.   
    When he'd set the letter aside and unpacked the box fully there were thirteen metal samples in all. "Okay, first thing's first. We need to analyze the make up of these. See if there's a way to synthesize them without having to go to the source. Because I really don't want to have to hire a wizard lawyer and fight the bank."   
    "And if they cannot be synthesized, sir?"   
    "Then we figure out which ones can be used in an alloy. I will get this thing," Tony said, putting a hand to the warm, glowing disk in his chest, "figured out one way or another."   


**o0o**   


    Pepper found him just as he'd finished getting out of his armor in the lab, a package in one hand and her own coffee in the other. "This came for you," she said, holding up the package, wrapped in brown paper and tied with a bit of twine.  
    "Yeah?" he said as he stepped off the assembly platform with ease. She set the package down on the nearest desk and watched as he, like a kid in a candy store, rushed to examine it before pulling the strings and ripping through the paper. The box was made of a dark wood with a hinged lid.  Forgetting for the moment that Pepper was there, he eagerly undid the latch and peered inside. There, amidst packing straw, was a gunmetal gray hunk of metal.   
    "What is it?" Pepper asked, trying to peer inside. Tony slammed the lid closed and latched it back.   
    "Possibly the answer to my prayers," he said.   
    "I didn't know you prayed."   
    "I didn't," Tony said. "Then I took one of my own bombs to the chest. Sort of puts some things in perspective." He picked up the paper and inspected the address information, noting that there wasn't any sort of normal postage markings. Just a few stamps showing London and New York. "This didn't come by DHL did it? I hate that delivery girl they use."   
    Pepper frowned. "Actually, I wanted to ask you about that..." she said glancing between his mysterious package and himself. "Are you training owls to act like carrier pigeons?"   
    "What?"   
    "A giant black owl was sitting with it on the front doorstep."   
    Tony stared at her, then rolled his eyes. "No, of course not. Probably one of Harry's mad science projects," he said. Pepper didn't look very convinced.

  
**o0o**

  
    Healthcare for Tony after the arc reactor installation was... difficult.   
    Hell, it was already difficult even before Afghanistan. Having two biological parents who were, for lack of a more personally amusing term, magicians it meant he was less susceptible to normal human illnesses. Less likely to catch a regular flu strain, but more likely to catch one that had him also wanting to square dance for some ungodly reason. Dragon Pox had been one terribly difficult childhood illness of his - when his magical maladies had first begun and normal doctors just wouldn't cut it.   
    Given his... uncommon medical history he knew trying to get actual normal doctors involved would be a problem. But at the same time the arc reactor in his chest - the big, glowing, warm piece of brilliant technology that was keeping him alive - would also implode or possibly explode if even a wee little diagnostic spell was cast over him by his usual medical team.   
    So when the palladium poisoning began - and yes Tony was fairly certain it was the palladium - he re-wrote part of JARVIS's code with as much muggle and magical medical information he could get his hands on, and ensured the bodiless butler would assimilate more on its own. This resulted in three day crash course binges of a variety of obscure potion recipes and charms he could never hope to perform even before the shrapnel. These binges of course happened between bouts of playing hero, tinkering with his suit, and his attempts to use a new goblin metal alloy he'd managed to get fabricated for use in experimental gadgets. Namely, a new phone for a few of his not-as-tedious relatives so they wouldn't keep blowing them up by accident.   
    It was between binges and busy work that JARVIS had notified him of a potential treatment. It was by no means a cure for the palladium poisoning, but it may buy him a little more time and stave off the effects. All the ingredients, Tony was pleased to see, could be bought a one of those overpriced health food stores and none of them had magical properties. So at least it wouldn't kill him just to be near him.   
    The first time he downed one of those gross, green looking shakes he wanted to gag. It nearly as bad as Harry's attempts at basic potions. But if it would help keep the palladium in check, he was willing to try anything.

  
**o0o**

  
    Tony had made some progress on the magic and tech front, but nowhere near what he needed to make it safe for himself. With Hermione and Harry's help, and the various samples of goblin metals, he was able to build four prototypes. Two phones, a laptop, and a television. The metal alloy he'd created by mixing two of the goblin metals together with common aluminum made the casings stronger, but also allowed the objects to sort of absorb magic cast on them.   
    It unfortunately took so long simply because of the distances involved. That and once the items left Tony's possession, he couldn't be near them again.   
    Tony sent everything to Hermione, who tinkered with them and ran numerous tests before sending them on to Harry in order to see if it could survive him.   
    So far, only one phone had survived the testing.   
    And it was this phone that Harry currently had with him, chatting away amicably with Tony and testing the video capture capabilities in a wholly magical space when their conversation was rudely interrupted by some kind of commotion going on behind Harry, complete with a technicolor light show.   
    "What the hell was that?"   
    _"Bollocks,"_ Harry groaned. _"I'll call you back,"_ Harry muttered under his breath.   
    Just before the video call dropped he could hear Harry shouting about pissing off a muggle bondage pirate.

  
**o0o**   


    "Hey 'Mione! Are you watching this?!" Ron exclaimed, stopping by the window of the electronics store in the mall. Hermione had stopped, turned around to see her husband standing there with shopping bags hanging off one arm and a scone in his other hand. "I think Tony just got into one of those racing car things."  
    "Ronald, you know what a car is," she said with a huff as the walked back over to fetch her husband. However, she did stop to stare at the screens in the window as they replayed what had just happened. "Oh no... This is not going to end well..."   
    " _The Potter Luck_?"   
    She nodded slowly as nearby their friend was pacing back and forth near a wishing fountain full of pennies, nickels, and dimes. He was angrily snapping into the phone at someone, repeatedly telling them "No, I will NOT join your bloody super boyband you pompous one-eyed git. Go find an island and bury some treasure or something!"   
    However, the moment their friend joined them at the display window, asking them what's going on, the power flickered as the camera zoomed in on the wreckage in Monaco and Iron Man getting into his suit. Harry snarled when the televisions cut off and stormed off in a rage, knowing he couldn't do anything to help. After all - magic and technology just don't mix.   
    "I thought he did alright there 'till that one bloke sliced his car to pieces," Ron said before taking another bite off his scone. His wife sighed and took him by the elbow. "Come along, Ronald," was all she said as they followed Harry towards the exit.

  
**o0o**   


    Two days after the fight at the Stark Expo against Whiplash, Tony Stark answered the door expecting a package from his Gringotts contact in England to instead discover a young woman in a DHL uniform looking rather peeved and giving him a rather special delivery.  
    At least, that's what she called the red handprint across his face and the message, "Special delivery. He says you know what you did and if you do it again he will show up on your doorstep and knock some sense into you and he doesn't care if your chest thingie implodes because of it. Now sign here." And she'd held up the tablet for him to sign, remembering from the last time she'd seen him not to hand him things.   
    Once she was gone, he scowled at the disembodied voice and complained that he'd told JARVIS never to let that driver come back.   
    When Tony thought back on the "special delivery" from that morning he stalked back into his lab and initiated the _Hocus Pocus_ protocol. "JARVIS, take the plans for the tower, copy them over to the Abracadabra file, then call Hermione. I have an idea," he said, scratching his chin in thought as he rotated the blueprints before scrapping nearly all of the internal support structure and starting over with plans for another metal. "Oh, and get in touch with the no-maj arm for Gringotts and find out exactly how much goblin steel costs and how large of a quantity we can get. Oh! And I need to get in touch with Harry and find out exactly what that vault of his is made of," he said as he scrapped an entire floor of the tower fortress he planned to build and started over with a new, more magical purpose in mind.

  
**o0o**   


    Tony stared at the devices in the box.  
    The black owl hooted softly on the balcony.   
    The brown parcel paper on the table nearby boasted a very elegant scrawl, declaring the sender's name to be Hermione Granger-Weasley. Inside the box were three pieces of technology, all identical. All glowing a soft, steady blue.   
    "She did it. She actually did it..." he said to the owl since it was the only thing in the room. "JARVIS," he said louder.   
    "Yes, Master Stark?"   
    "Call my private doctor. I'll need her if something goes wrong. I need to test one of these in a suit so pull out one I'm not likely to use much and put it through the paces," he said.

  
**o0o**   


    Four days after he'd swapped out the arc reactor in his chest the tower was finally finished. The foundation reinforced with the same strange and expensive combination of goblin metals that comprised the Vault that his biological father often locked himself inside. The entire building reinforced with goblin steel to absorb any power or energy or rather, anything at all that would make it stronger, and to better defend against that which would make it weaker.  
    His aunt Hermione and uncle Bill were due to come in next week to further test the improvements as well as the less-tech filled floor to make sure everything ran smoothly. Or as smoothly as things could run when you tried to merge the technical and the magical - two forces that by the laws of nature themselves could never be compatible.  
    But for now... as he clinked champagne glasses with the lovely Pepper Potts in the penthouse suite of his beloved Stark Tower...  
    "Twelve percent."  
    Unfortunately for Tony, raised by muggles and squib he may be, not even changing his name allowed him to escape that bizarre and primordial force the more magically inclined parts of his family called "The Potter Luck". Sure, things always turned out fine, for the most part.  
    But one sight of Agent stepping out of the elevator and hearing Pepper's cheerful greeting of the man by first name - yes of course Tony knew the man's name, he just didn't like using it - he knew that damnable family curse had reared its ugly head once again.  
    It was time to do that that whole _people saving thing_ again.


End file.
